The present invention relates in general to toilet automation and ventilation systems and more particularly to a new modular multifunction apparatus that mounts onto most standard toilets to provide the capability to automate numerous toilet related functions. Although its primary purpose is intended to function as an automatic toilet bowl ventilation system, the device can be fitted without the ventilation components since its modular nature allows it to be configured with any one or all of its other features, such as an automatic flushing system, seat and seat lid motion system and sound generation system.
The conventional method of bathroom ventilation involves the removal of bathroom odors after the odors departure from the toilet bowl and dispersion in the ambient air. Modern bathrooms tend to be small windowless rooms with tiny, inadequate exhaust fans mounted in the ceiling with ducting leading to the outdoor air. Upon activation, said systems attempts to draw odorous air out of the bathroom. Because the odor is removed after its dispersion from the toilet, said systems require lengthy operation time to ventilate the entire bathroom area and are thus are often ineffective in removing the odor. The ineffectiveness these ceiling exhaust fans has encouraged the development of ventilating means which draws the unwanted gases and odors directly from the toilet bowls before the odors can disperse into the surrounding air. These systems then expel the odorous air into an air filtration unit or to the outdoors through a ventilation duct. Over the years, numerous of such ventilation systems have been designed to solve the bathroom odor problem. Prior art includes a multitude of methods for removing odors from toilet bowls. However, these designs suffer from a number of problems, as discussed below.
Many of the prior art toilet ventilation systems disclosed in the patents are technical in complexity and relatively high cost to manufacture, requiring a whole new toilet installation. This kind of prior art has the major disadvantage or drawback of not being adapted for easy mounting or compatible with the wide variety of existing toilet configurations and designs. Examples of such systems that are complicated and/or would require a new toilet installation include U.S. Pat. No. 6,637,040 (Alba), U.S. Pat. No. 5,079,782 (Sim) and U.S. Pat. No. 4,165,544 (Barry).
Many of the prior art toilet ventilation systems require a dedicated wall ventilation duct near the toilet. As many bathrooms do not have such an available duct, this type of ventilated toilet installation would require expensive structural modification of the building to provide for the ventilation conduits. Examples of prior art that need a dedicated bathroom ventilation duct can be seen in U.S. Pat. No. 4,402,091 (Ellis), U.S. Pat. No. 5,906,009 (Sakar), U.S. Pat. No. 5,638,553 (Loewen), U.S. Pat. No. 3,495,282 (Taggart) and U.S. Pat. No. 6,678,900 (Ware).
Many of the prior art have designs that use weak battery operated fans that cannot possibly move enough air on a regular basis to effectively perform the job of removing odors from the bowl before they escape into the bathroom. Examples of battery operated units can be seen in U.S. Pat. No. 6,701,538 (Hunnicutt), U.S. Pat. No. 6,694,534 (Stone) and U.S. Pat. No. 6,546,567 (Kuzniar).
Other prior art designs incorporate air duct passageways that are far too small to move enough air to make the units effective. Even if enough air was to somehow be pulled through their tiny passageways, unacceptable obnoxious noise would be produced. A common approach of units that use inadequate ventilation ducting and then suffer from insufficient airflow volume to adequately ventilate the toilet can be seen in U.S. Pat. No. 6,772,449 (Wolfe), U.S. Pat. No. 5,724,682 (Johnson) and U.S. Pat. No. 4,094,023 (Smith).
Many of the prior art are rather unsightly in the bathroom, using bulky components that are visible to a person using the toilet, which detracts from the overall appearance of the bathroom. Examples of these kinds of prior art can be seen in U.S. Pat. No. 5,727,262 (Littlejohn), U.S. Pat. No. 4,365,361 (Sanstrom) and U.S. Pat. No. 3,849,808 (Olson).
Many prior art designs use devices that present cleaning and odor problems that is inherent when the units mount on or adjacent to the toilet since these designs use ductwork passages that are exposed to the toilet bowl and can easily become contaminated. Keeping these toilet area parts clean can be a challenge, considering the normal toilet bowl environment. Since they can be very hard to clean, infectious waste can collect there and can then produce more odor to the bathroom environment than the system is trying to eliminate. Ventilation units of this design can be seen in U.S. Pat. No. 4,494,255 (Drummond), U.S. Pat. No. 3,916,459 (Ivancevic) and U.S. Pat. No. 6,202,226 (Shoptaugh).
In general, none of the existing ventilation systems for removing odors directly at the toilet have been commercially successful. There is still a need for an economical toilet ventilation system that is easily connectable to the toilet bowl and works efficiently. It would also be beneficial to have a ventilation system that has a similar appearance to a standard toilet seat and toilet bowl and had minimal cleaning and maintenance requirements.